Hear Me Out
by Puppetjax
Summary: The Pound Puppies are ecstatic to find a new adorable puppy a home, but learn it will be rather tricky when they learn something shocking about him; the puppy is deaf!


Everything was going perfectly well at Shelter 17. They were getting ready for a new adoption. "When's she gonna get here? Where is she? I can't wait!" Said a small, ecstatic puppy. Lucky turned around to look at her. "Really soon, Pico, I promise." She replied with a jump in the air and a joyful cheer. Suddenly, a car drove through the front gates. "Make that now," Lucky corrected.

The car parked in front of the building and a young child immediately ran out towards the kennel. Pico couldn't help but run up to the fence and stand against it. "Mom, look at her! I want that one!" The child said. "Are you sure, honey?" Said her mom, who caught up with her just now. "110 percent!" She replied. "Okay, Hannah. Let's go talk to the owner." Her mom took her by the hand and walked into the building with her.

Lucky and the four other Pound Puppies approached Pico. "You know, before you go, we need to tell you something," Lucky said to her. Strudel placed a tag on Pico's collar. "Once a Pound Puppy, always a Pound Puppy!" All five of them recited in unison. "Oh, boy! This is gonna be so cool!" She replied. Hannah and her mom returned with Olaf. He opened the kennel entrance, picked Pico up, and placed her in Hannah's arms.

"Thank you so much," said Hannah's mom to Olaf. The three of them got back in the car and left as quickly as they came. "That's always my favorite part," sighed Strudel. "Well, at least we can take a break for a little while," said Lucky. Everyone lied down where they were.

Only about a minute after Pico's departure, Ketchum's van drove into the pound. Ketchum walked out, opened the back door, and grabbed a black puppy by the collar. Olaf ran toward him. "Oh, I can take this little guy for ya," he said as he took the puppy from him. Olaf walked back towards the kennel and placed him inside while Ketchum drove off.

The puppy looked around for a moment, then went straight into the far corner of the cage and lied down, away from everyone else. They all looked confused. Lucky decided to step up. He walked toward him. "Is everything alright?" He asked. The puppy continued to sulk. "How about telling us your name?" Cookie joined Lucky. Still, no response. Squirt decided to share his opinion with the rest of them. "Ya know, we ain't got all day. What are we wasting our time for? The kid obviously just wants to be left alone." He said. Everyone soon left, though rather hesitantly.

The Pound Puppies went downstairs and started talking. "Strudel, fire up the FKD. I'll try to talk to him anyways." Commanded Lucky. Strudel went away to follow his orders. "But Lucky, how will you get his attention?" Asked Cookie. He responded. "I won't give up motivating him to have a conversation with me. He's bound to break at some point." Without saying another word, Lucky hurried up to the surface.

Lucky hopped up to the ground and looked around for the puppy. He found him, in the same spot he was in before. He then attempted to get his attention. "Hey, kid. Mind coming over here for a sec?" He asked. He still remained motionless. Lucky was through with this. He marched up to him and tapped him on the back a few times. "Hey, can I talk to you?" Asked Lucky. The puppy stood up, looked around, and spotted Lucky. He faced him and smiled up at him. Lucky took a couple steps back. "Hi, there, I'm Lucky." He said a little awkwardly to him. The puppy's smile went away and he lied back down right where he was. 'This is a little weird,' he thought to himself.

Meanwhile downstairs, Strudel was working on the FKD. She had it almost up and running until she was interrupted. Sparky and Mr. Nut Nut ran into her lab and started gibbering at her. "Yes, yes, what is it?" She asked them. Sparky chattered. "What!?" She exclaimed. Sparky finished his sentence. "I can't believe it. I'll go tell Lucky right away." She answered. She hurried to the surface to go inform Lucky what she just heard.

"Lucky!" Strudel shouted when she reached the top. "Strudel? Did you activate the FKD yet?" He asked. "Not quite, but there's something I need to tell you." She replied. "What's going on?" Answered Lucky. "The squirrels told me there's a phone call, requesting you specifically!" Exclaimed Strudel. Lucky immediately ran towards the hole. "I'll be there as soon as I can." He said. Strudel and Lucky then retreated back underground. The puppy Lucky was speaking to looked around the lawn, and spotted a red rubber ball. He smiled and ran to go play with it.

Lucky hurried through the tunnels until he arrived at the room he was looking for. Be ran up to the video phone and pressed a button on the keyboard. "Howdy there, Lucky!" General Dolly's face appeared on the screen. "Good afternoon, Dolly." Greeted Lucky. "I've received some news that I believe you might find useful." She began. "Great! I'm always happy to hear from you, Dolly. So, what's going on?" Lucky asked.

"We believe you have just gotten another puppy to adopt, is this true?" She asked. "Well, yeah." Responded Lucky, refraining to tell her most of the details. Dolly answered. "Well, I've just received a news update from Shelter 52." She told him. "They've told us that they recently tried to get a cute lil' puppy dog adopted, but failed." "Failed!?" Reacted Lucky. "Yeah, it's always unfortunate when a shelter just can't find a home for someone." She continued. "Anyway, they sent him over to your shelter to see if you could try. He's completely black, a lab, I think. Not much of a talker, either. That's him, ain't it?" She asked. Remembering, Lucky answered. "Yep, that last part is the whole problem." "Well, there's something I need to tell you about him." Dolly spoke with a more serious tone. "Well, you see, his name is Epsilon, and he's actually deaf." "What!? How could that be?" Lucky was shocked. "Dunno, I reckon he was just born like that." Dolly answered unexpectedly. She then continued her statement. "Well, I know he can understand English, y'all just gotta figure out how to communicate with him. I'll leave you to it, good luck!" She said. Lucky was confused. He needed more information. "Dolly, Dolly, wait!" He shouted. She then hung up the call before she heard Lucky. "This is just great. What are we supposed to do?" He muttered to himself. "Well, I better go tell the others." He exited the room he was in and went to go find the rest of his team.

Up on the ground level, Epsilon ran towards a ball he found. Just as he approached it, Niblet appeared out of nowhere. "Hey, little puppy! Were you on your way to play, too?" He asked him. Epsilon sat down and looked at him with a confused expression. "Well, actually, this is kinda my ball, and I was gonna use it." Niblet continued. "Hey, maybe we can both play with it together!" He suggested. Epsilon just stood up and backed up a few steps. "It's okay, little guy! You can talk to me. My name's Niblet. What's yours?" Just when Niblet thought he was going to speak, Lucky came up through the hole. "Niblet, downstairs, please." He commanded. "Sure thing, Lucky!" He shouted back to him. Lucky retreated back. Niblet turned toward Epsilon. "You better stay up here. Us smart and mature grown-ups are probably gonna have a smart and mature meeting." He said to him. He then hurried down the hole.

Niblet entered the main room to find the other four waiting for him. Once all of them arrived, Lucky began to speak. "I've called you here on behalf of the information I learned about Epsilon." Lucky explained. "Who in the world is Epsilon?" Asked Cookie. "Our puppy, that's his name. He's who I wanted to talk to you about." He answered. "Yeah, I, for one, kinda want some answers. Why doesn't he chat?" Asked Squirt. "Well, you see, Epsilon, is deaf." All four gasped. "This explains a lot." Answered Strudel. "Poor guy, that's why he isn't talking, isn't it?" Cookie asked rhetorically. "What's a deaf?" Asked Niblet. "Ya see, it's like when a dog's ears don't work." Responded Squirt. "Oh, no!" Niblet shouted back. "Is it contagious? What if my ears stop working? I need my ears, Lucky! I need them!" "It's not contagious, Niblet!" Shouted an annoyed Lucky. "Anyways, now that we know what's wrong with him, I believe we can start looking for his perfect person. The only problem that I see, is that we don't know how to communicate with him."

"Oh, please. Leave that to me." Strudel responded. "I'll feed his info through the FKD. Meanwhile, I'll also work on a system to speak with Epsilon. Meet me in the lab in approximately five minutes, and bring Epsilon." She commanded. She turned around and headed back to the lab, followed by some squirrels.

Lucky and the three others went upstairs to check on Epsilon. He was running around, playing with the red ball. It was the first time they've ever seen him enjoying himself since his arrival. He stopped and glanced gleefully at the Pound Puppies. They smiled, trying to convey the most positive attitude that they could to him. Epsilon continued playing by himself. Lucky felt slightly embarrassed over performing numerous attempts to try to talk to him but never considering the actual circumstance. The four stayed up with him for the five minutes Strudel suggested.

After the time had passed, Lucky and the others decided to head back down. They stood up and got Epsilon's attention by tapping him on the back, but paused when they realized they had no idea how to tell him to follow them down. Lucky then got an idea. "You three head down. I'm gonna try something." They did as they were told with Epsilon watching. Lucky waved his foreleg over the hole to try to gesture him to go down. He did it for an awkwardly long time before Epsilon finally caught on to what they were saying. He walked over to Lucky and descended right after Lucky did.

Epsilon stared upwards and around, marveling at the underground network. Lucky kept trying to gesture him to follow him. Epsilon quickly caught up. They walked all the way to Strudel's lab, where the FKD was located. When they entered, Strudel noticed them right away. "Good, you brought Epsilon. Come in, the FKD is just about ready." She stated. They all gathered around the FKD. Epsilon looked at the machine in awe. He wondered what it was for. "FKD, activate speech-to-text feature." Shouted Strudel, suddenly. It began speaking, but captions also appeared on the monitor of what it was saying. Epsilon was reading the captions. "Epsilon's perfect person is..." It said and read. Epsilon grew excited when he suddenly learned what this was about. It read his person's address and traits. "Christian, age 12. Also enjoys playing, but his most notable trait is that he is also..." The monitor suddenly went blank and the machine started smoking and sparking heavily, interrupting its sentence. The squirrels examined it and chattered loudly. "Schnitzels! The machine broke down!" Interjected Strudel. "Good thing we got where we're going already." Said Cookie. "What are we waiting for? Let's hurry over there!" She continued. "Not so fast, Cookie." Said Lucky. "We still need to tell Epsilon where we're headed." They all turned to face him. Epsilon gazed up at them with a confused look and glanced around. Lucky did what he did last time to try to signal Epsilon to follow them. He happily started after them. "I think he's finally got it." Said Cookie.

After a fifteen-minute walk into the city, all six arrived at a house that they suddenly stopped at. Epsilon had no idea where they were, until suddenly, a boy with short blonde hair came through the front door. He shut it behind him and ran into the yard to play. "What do you think, Lucky? Looks like him to me." Said Cookie. "Definitely. Look at Epsilon." He said back. Epsilon sat out of sight, gazing at the boy with an obvious expression of amazement and overflowing joy. "Perfect, but remember, there's something we still have to do. Strudel, did you take care of that?" Said Lucky. "All taken care of. Do not worry." She answered.

Strudel, along with Sparky and Mr. Nut Nut approached Epsilon. Sparky showed him the front side of a silver tag with the inscription "Once a Pound Puppy, always a Pound Puppy" on the front. Although he didn't fully understand it, he was ecstatic to receive it anyway. The squirrels placed the tag on his collar. He ran over to the Pound Puppies, and gave them one last grateful gesture. Lucky gave him a slight nod in agreement. He immediately ran to his perfect person.

Christian sat down under a tree to take a break, tired from running. As he did so, Epsilon walked up to him and licked his hand. Christian looked over to his left to see a puppy dog, wagging his tail, begging to be loved. Christian grabbed him and hugged him, immediately showing signs of affection. He ran to his front door with Epsilon in his arms and knocked on it. A woman, who appeared to be his mom, stepped through. Christian then did something unexpected. He started waving his hands and fingers around in front of his mother. She then looked as if she were deciding something, and then nodded yes. Christian bounced up and down with glee. They then proceeded inside. The Pound Puppies didn't understand what they were saying to each other, but it was still heartwarming to watch, anyways.


End file.
